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	Bishop to Apologise for Vicar's Sex Abuse Northern Echo November 10, 2007 http://www.thisisthenortheast.co.uk/display.var.1823528.0.bishop_to_apologise_for_vicars_sex_abuse.php A BISHOP is to issue a public apology over the actions of a paedophile vicar. The Bishop of Whitby, the Right Reverend Robert Ladds, will also invite the child abuse victims of former Middlesbrough clergyman Trevor Ward to pray for a return of trust to the parish. Ward, the vicar of the Church of St Agnes, Easterside, Middlesbrough, was jailed for seven years and stripped of his priestly orders after being convicted of nine counts of sex abuse in March 1988. He died last December. The youngsters involved were both altar boys and choirboys and some of the offences took place in the church. The York Diocese of the Church of England co-operated fully with Cleveland Police and promptly removed Ward from his post - but has never made a formal public apology. The bishop will make the apology when he visits St Agnes a week today, for a service of reconciliation. He said: "Abuse by a priest is a terrible and shocking thing because a vital part of a priest's work is to reach out with the love of God to people who need help, support or friendship - and so must be worthy of their trust. "I want to offer a deep apology to the individuals who were so badly hurt and the community whose trust was abused by Trevor Ward while he ministered in Easterside, where he did so much harm over six years. "I hope that many of those in Easterside whose lives were touched or damaged in any way by these dreadful events will join us on the November 17, to offer our sorrow and pain from the past to God, and to commit ourselves to a future where the Church deserves the trust people want to place in it." The service will include prayers for the cleansing of the church and reconciliation with the Easterside community hurt by the actions of Ward, who was vicar of St Agnes from October 1981. He resigned in his police cell, following his arrest in November 1987, at the request of Bishop Robert's predecessor, the Right Reverend Gordon Bates. A diocese spokesman said: "It is appropriate for the church to stand up and say we are sorry that we failed to appoint a good and godly minister there in the Eighties. It takes a long time for hurt that severe to be addressed." Ward, who was arrested 20 years ago yesterday, had been abused as an eight-year-old, and had two sons by his wife. He was sent to prison on one charge of buggery, two counts of gross indecency and six offences of indecent assault on boys, in the early Eighties.
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